Conventionally, various kinds of floor coverings have been widely used. Since floor coverings are stepped on by foot soles and shoe soles, the floor coverings are more likely to be damaged and more likely to be soiled. For this reason, the properties of the floor coverings are desired to have damage resistance and anti-soiling property. In addition, the floor coverings are desired to have not only these properties but also flexibility from the viewpoint of workability. In view of the above, as a layer of a surface side of a floor covering that contacts foot soles or shoe soles, the layer that enhances properties such as anti-soiling property to a synthetic resin layer, or the like has been proposed. The term damage resistance as used herein means a property of being hardly likely to cause damages of scraping on a surface of a floor covering, and the term anti-soiling property means a property of being hardly likely to be soiled, or a property capable of easily removing soils.
Patent Publication 1 discloses an anti-slipping floor covering having excellent anti-soiling property, characterized in that the floor covering comprises a decorative layer containing colored synthetic resin granules formed on a synthetic resin layer including an inorganic and/or organic fiber sheet installed therein, and a transparent or semitransparent anti-soiling synthetic resin layer formed on the decorative layer, wherein the floor covering comprises bumpiness that reaches to the decorative layer from a surface of the anti-soiling synthetic resin layer.
In addition, Patent Publication 2 discloses a vinyl chloride-based resin composition having anti-soiling ability, characterized in that the resin composition contains a plasticizer, wherein the plasticizer contains a texanol isobutyrate and/or benzoic acid ester-based plasticizer in a proportion of from 50 to 100% by weight as an anti-soiling plasticizer, and the patent publication discloses that the resin composition can be used as a surface layer of the floor covering.